Fog drifts over the horizon, creeps across the fields, and obscures the view. A remnant of evening light glows reticently through the swathes of mist, beneath which flocks of black birds swoop into the sky. A solitary human figure, barely visible, crouches in front of a simple straw hut, seeking protection from the damp chill. Alternatively: rays of sunlight gently illuminate the cloudy sky. Like a hermit sunk deep in contemplation, a man rests in the shadow of the warming straw in the midst of mist-covered fields. He seems to be enjoying what only we can see: the quiet beauty of nature.

Seen either as a sensitive observation of a simple life in the midst of nature or as the opening scene of a horror film: Friedrich’s Wafts of Mist (1) emphatically demonstrates the extent to which the interpretation of a work lies in the individual perception of the beholder. With this ambivalence, the artist leaves the viewer to themselves and to their immersion in the picture. The simplified composition is based on mathematical calculation, which helped Friedrich to determine its harmonious pictorial effect: the ratio of sky to earth follows the golden section, with the hut embedded exactly on the central vertical axis. Johannes Grave has pointed out the origin of the straw hut – used repeatedly by Friedrich – as a pictorial element in the work of his Copenhagen teacher Jens Juel. (2) In contrast to Jan Luyken’s emblematic depictions for the Ethica Naturalis, in which he added two figures to the foreground of a misty landscape, Friedrich instead shifts the encounter between human and nature to the picture’s middle ground. (3) By separating the lone figure from the background with the hut, a certain distance remains between the individual and his surroundings, inviting viewers to reflect.

Georg Andreas Reimer acquired this painting while Friedrich was still alive, in 1834. He is considered one of Friedrich’s important supporters, and his collection is known to have included between thirty-six and forty-four paintings by the artist. (4) Wafts of Mist was sold from his collection posthumously in 1842, but it is still unknown to whom. In 1911, Alfred Lichtwark acquired it as the artist’s tenth painting for the collection of the Hamburger Kunsthalle. After the work was stolen from an exhibition in Frankfurt in 1994 it was returned to Hamburg unconditionally, and largely undamaged, in 2003.

Clara Blomeyer, in: exh. cat. Hamburg 2023, p. 258

(1) Börsch-Supan/Jähnig 1973, p. 362, no. 269.
(2) See Grave 2023, pp. 51–55.
(3) On Friedrich’s possible reference to the Ethica Naturalis, see Einem 1940, p. 163.
(4) Fouquet-Plumacher/Kawaletz 1996, p. 89.